MSc Social Protection Insights: February

📢 Current Student, Alradi Abdalla, Awarded DAAD Prize

Another month of celebrating the amazing accomplishments of our students!! Alradi Abdalla (Batch 2022) was recently awarded the the DAAD Prize for Outstanding Achievements of International Students while studying at German universities. Alradi has been an incredible colleague and addition to our program, bringing his expertise and experience from working with the International Disability Alliance . Congratulations to Alradi on the great achievement, we are excited to see where your future leads.

Module 4: Quantitative Methods

Batch 2023 is beginning the new year focusing on analytics and quantitative techniques.

M4.1 Econometrics // Simona Helmsmüller

• This course deals with understanding simple linear, nonlinear, and multiple regression, as well as testing for significance bias. Additionally, students learn about internal and external validity and causality. This course is key to preparing students for their research projects and thesis.

M4.2 Evaluation

• In the following course, students learn from social protection practitioners about the theory behind impact evaluation design, and the varying techniques, such as experimental and non-experimental. Analysis tools such as cost-benefit, and different benchmarks are introduced to show the diverse range of evaluation practices.

M4.3 Actuarial Practice

• Module 4.3 is a hands-on course applying all that students have learned with econometrics and evaluation, along with past concepts such as demography and social insurance. Students work with the lecturer to build out an actuarial valuation model and learn the role of actuaries and actuarial methods in good governance.

Module 4 familiarizes students with both ex-ante and ex-post evaluation and analysis methods. After completion of the course, students will be familiar with different evaluation techniques to assess the impact, the cost-benefit, cost-effectiveness and efficiency of social protection programs and critically reflect on different national and international approaches to evaluations of social protection systems and make suggestions for improvements.

Get to Know Our Students, Lecturers & Alumni

Student of the Month

Name: Waqas Ahmed

Batch: 2023

Country of Origin: Pakistan

Social Protection Experience: As an EU Program Coordinator, he manages Erasmus projects focused on community development, SDG promotion, intercultural exchange, and youth empowerment. His experience also includes volunteering in Pakistan's earthquake and flood recovery efforts.

Research Interests: Migrants and the Socially Disadvantaged

Alumni Spotlight

Name: Oscar Darío Sánchez González

Batch: 2021

Country of Origin: Colombia

Current Role: Researcher at the European Commission Project ECO-Ready for the creation of a framework to develop contingency plans in food security crisis

Master's Thesis Topic: Government as a Platform (GaaP) in Digital Social Protection

Previous Social Protection Experience: Digital social protection consultant

Meet our Lecturers

Name: Charles Crevier

Position: Programme Manager at the ITCILO

Teaching since: 2015

Course(s) in 2023/24: M4.3 Actuarial Practice

Expertise: Quantitative Techniques for Social Protection Policy Design, Actuarial Modeling, Social Budgeting, Capacity Building

Resources and Publications 

• The ILO recently published "100 years of social protection: The road to universal social protection systems and floors," consisting of a collection of 52 country cases showing how social protection has evolved over time across the globe. https://www.ilo.org/secsoc/information-resources/publications-and-tools/books-and-reports/WCMS_894190/lang--en/index.htm
• Institute of Development Studies staff and students have put together a new list of essential reading and listening list for 2023: Essential books and podcasts for 2023 - Institute of Development Studies (ids.ac.uk)
• Our honorary professor Krzysztof Hagemejer published on Adjusting to a changing world while sticking to principles. International Labour Organization responses to the challenges facing social protection systems in the 21st century.
• Following the module on the Delivery of Social Transfers, the Handbook on Social Protection Systems' authors Franziska Gassmann from United Nations University-MERIT and Daniele Malerba from the German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS) fittingly published a paper on Predicting social assistance beneficiaries: On the social welfare damage of data biases.
• Veronika Wodsak, another Handbook on Social Protection author, and colleagues report on “Disability Schemes and Programmes Around the World: Design and Compliance with International Social Security Standards”.
• For the German speakers: DEval - German Institute for Development Evaluation draws a conclusion on the achievement of the SDGs after reaching the halfway point of the 2030 Agenda: Policy Brief: Die Agenda 2030 in der öffentlichen Meinung: Eine Halbzeitbilanz

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